Broadcasting

New Zealand’s screen industry has become increasingly important as a source of employment and overseas revenue. It includes film production and post-production, television broadcasting, film distribution and exhibition.

Statistics New Zealand's data in April 2017 highlighted that the New Zealand film production revenue doubled in 2016 to more than $1 billion. A bounce-back from a quiet 2015 by Wellington's movie sector was mainly responsible. Overall, the total revenue of New Zealand's screen industry businesses increased 3 percent in 2016. Total screen industry revenue had been stable at just over $3 billion for the previous three years. However, 2016 saw a 15 percent increase in revenue from businesses involved in production and post-production. Total expenditure on screen productions remained stable, at $767 million; down 1 percent from $771 million in 2015. Almost 90 percent of this expenditure was in Auckland or Wellington ($681 million total).

NZ On Air is the government’s primary agency for funding local content on television, radio and the internet. Key achievements in the 2016/17 financial year were:

• Development of a plan to create an online home (HEIHEI) for local media content aimed at primary aged children
• A ground-breaking joint project with Google/YouTube to encourage successful New Zealand YouTubers to try their hands at new creative content
• Audiences of more than 300,000 for the 15 highest-rating funded television programmes
• An audience of over 100,000 for the most viewed funded on demand series
• Expansion of our support for investigative journalism both on television and online
• Delivery of a new music funding scheme that provides more support to promoting funded songs online as well as on radio.

Of particular importance to the New Zealand screen industry is funding from international production companies and investors. New Zealand has actively promoted itself as a film destination of choice, and provides a number of incentive schemes for productions which meet specific criteria. New Zealand has signed a number of co-production deals with other countries, and continues to pursue new agreements on a bilateral basis.

The New Zealand Film Commission oversees the development, financing, production, marketing and distribution of New Zealand films, domestically and internationally. It also administers grants and incentives designed to boost film production in New Zealand.

In 2017, fourteen Fresh Shorts were funded, with 62% of the filmmakers attached to these projects being women. Twelve new feature films, including five documentaries, also received offers for production financing.

Eleven Film Commission financed feature films were released in New Zealand cinemas with the highest grossing title being Chasing Great: Richie McCaw with $1,828,941. This makes it the highest ever grossing documentary at New Zealand cinemas.

The Interactive Development fund was introduced to encourage the development of interactive material with strong story content and thirty final New Zealand Screen Production Grant (NZSPG) certificates were issued, eleven to local production and nineteen to international.

In a January 2017 media release, the Motion Pictures Distributors' Association highlighted that for the third consecutive year, the New Zealand motion picture industry posted record revenues with a total Gross Box Office for 2016 of $206,605,000, up 6.8% from 2015’s previous record of $193 million. Leading the way in 2016’s record take was the locally produced box office behemoth, Hunt for the Wilderpeople which took in a record $12,181,582, making it the biggest ever local title and the 6th biggest movie of all time in New Zealand.

More people went to our New Zealand movies with attendance up from 4 million in 2015/16 to 4.7 million in the 2016/17 financial year.

The Ministry manages requests for non-commercial radio broadcasting licenses. Non-commercial radio frequencies only rarely become available but if a frequency or network of frequencies does become available the Ministry will award it to the applicant who best meets eligibility requirements and criteria such as showing a strong geographic or community of interest connection with the target audience, with programming focused on the needs and interests of the audiences they serve. For more details, visit our non-commercial radio broadcasting licences page.